If you take a look through a microscope and look at a polishing sponge in detail, you can clearly see the structure of the foam that has been created by the “reticulation”. During this process, the thin “skins” between the individual foam cells that form during production are deliberately destroyed.
For this purpose, a mixture of gaseous, flammable substances (e.g. oxyhydrogen gas) is mixed with approx. + 185 °C hot water vapour (under pressure) simultaneously with the ignition pulse. The explosively released reaction heat ensures the perforation of the foam cell walls
The process was patented in plastics technology in 1965 by Scott Paper & Co in the USA.
Reticulation makes our polishing pads permeable to liquids and air or gas.
